


a world where there's safety in falsehood

by silpium



Series: bare drabbles [2]
Category: bare: A Pop Opera - Hartmere/Intrabartolo
Genre: Drabble Collection, F/F, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Gen, M/M, Other, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-01
Updated: 2018-10-31
Packaged: 2019-07-23 11:42:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 31
Words: 3,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16158293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/silpium/pseuds/silpium
Summary: A collection of bare: a Pop Opera drabbles, one per day according to theInktober 2018 prompts.





	1. stripped bare beneath all the layers

**Author's Note:**

> big thanks to my sweetheart [robin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/luciferTM/pseuds/luciferTM) for betaing!
> 
> thank you so much for opening this up and reading!! please feel free to leave a comment with concrit or otherwise; i'd love to hear whatever you have to say.
> 
> i am [@queeenmab](https://twitter.com/queeenmab) on twitter! please feel free to send me a message if you wanna chat or anything! :-)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #1, "poisonous."

Matt thinks that he is a good person. He always follows the church’s teachings to the letter; he is committed to his work and those he loves; he is conscientious, trustworthy, kind.

But as he walks into the auditorium, Matt realizes this: he doesn’t _deserve_ to always be second to Jason, who doesn’t appreciate how lucky he is, just how much he has.

It pours out, like an opened dam: _maybe he would make you feel real special, like I always wanted to_. It spills, and spills, and spills.

He has never felt quite so free before in his life.


	2. and you were the answer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #2, "tranquil."

There are moments when Jason's mind quiets down and the storm clears up: no more gale, no more downpour, no more bitter cold. Such a calm is rare, and rarer still that the sun has the courage to show its face.

Jason is accustomed to the constant rain, and he's come to accept that it will always be there. Nadia knows about it, is the same, and they help one another. Still, sometimes it just isn't enough.

But the clouds part most of all for Peter; and the realization that he is in love does not come too far behind.


	3. dream a dream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #3, "roasted."

It’s not that Nadia doesn’t hate Ivy, because she _does_ : it's a bitter, loathsome hate that crawls up from the pit of her stomach and through her throat like bile.

The thing is, Nadia still remembers exactly how it felt to think that Ivy was easy to love, maybe even easy to fall _in_ love with. But people are strange: sometimes, they say, do, and believe just what burns the most, right down to the bone, with hurt and betrayal.

(Things change.)

(If Nadia still wonders, every so often, what it might have been like, then nobody has to know.)


	4. holding all enthralled

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #4, "spell."

Ivy knows exactly the cards she has been dealt; the only one she is grateful for is how everyone finds her beautiful.

It fills an emptiness that is never quite expelled. Still, it helps. With her charm, she never has to be alone, never has to spend nights with only herself and her thoughts.

(Ivy can work her magic on everyone but herself.)

Ivy knows she could experience a closeness far realer than this. She experienced it back in middle school, but this—this will have to be enough. (Even though it can’t be, she manages, as she always has.)


	5. ever after

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #5, "chicken."

Jason loves Peter from the depths of his heart. There’s something special about _them_ , something that makes them as a pair seem right. 

But there’s this gut-wrenching fear. The memories of his father and the darkness of the hallway closet, of the church’s teachings, of Matt during rehearsal, are enough to grind his thoughts to a halt.

He’s himself, a part he’s buried deep, deep down, when he tells Peter that _there’s no such thing as heroes who are queer_. The disconnect between who he wishes he could be and his self is nauseating, petrifying; he hates himself for it.


	6. because i feel complete with him

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #6, "drooling."

Peter meets Jason, that kind of kid that everyone wishes they could be (charming, smart, funny, athletic, and _handsome_ ), when he is ten.

Peter knows he shouldn't, knows that it's wrong, but he always finds himself staring at Jason whenever Jason isn't looking. Peter thinks it’s jealousy until he recognizes the way his heart squeezes, then runs double-time whenever Jason smiles at him, and he thinks, _oh. So this is what it’s like_. 

Peter knows he shouldn't. Peter knows it's wrong. But that doesn't stop the slow crawl towards that first, tender kiss when they're twelve, towards falling in love.


	7. a perfect part

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #7, "exhausted."

Jason is not one to ever show vulnerability. He hides it all behind a saccharine act, holding everyone captivated except for Peter and Nadia. Sometimes, even they’re fooled.

The first time Jason is comfortable enough to fall asleep before he does, the first time Jason cries in front of him, the first time Jason speaks candidly about his family: Peter knows these memories, intimate as they are, like the back of his hand. Whenever Peter revisits them, traces just how the mask was gradually exhausted around him, he can’t help but think that he is lucky to be let in.


	8. what a tale of star-crossed lovers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #8, "star."

When Nadia was a child, she always wondered what was wrong with her. What it was that made her parents not love her.

She never quite understood. She did everything to please them, throwing herself into her music and books until it, a world separate from her own, became what kept her afloat.

That’s still what it represents, even now, during those quiet nights at home when she can’t help but let her mind wander and wonder what everything could have been like if she was prettier, more likable, kinder, more—

Her thoughts always return to the same, age-old insecurities.


	9. the boy i believed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #9, "precious."

They are sixteen; they are young, hopelessly in love, and enamored by the way their hands fit one another’s perfectly. The September air carries a brisk chill as the leaves turn to a kaleidoscope of colors.

Their hands are cold in each other’s as they walk through the park, watching the leaves spiral down to the ground. They are alone together; they are happy.

When they get back to their dorm, in the dark of the night, Jason tells Peter this: “I think you might be my soulmate.”

Peter’s heart trembles, and trembles, and trembles with the truth of it.


	10. you have touched my soul

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #10, "flowing."

Love does not come smoothly for Ivy. She has tried, and tried, and tried to open up her heart, to love and be loved like she wishes she could, and yet—and yet, she just can't. 

She finds the closest thing. It's not enough and can never be enough. Still, it’s the best substitute she’ll ever get.

Then Jason steps into the picture, with his kind words and soft eyes and gentle hands, and she realizes this: she could love Jason just as easily as a river flows. In all likelihood, that dam has already been opened, and she does.


	11. remember the word, forget

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #11, "cruel."

As Peter gets older, years after it all, he finds that things fade and blur in his memory. The quirk to Jason’s smile, the placement of the freckles in his eyes, the pitch of his laughter.

It’s not that he’s forgetting, no. It’s just difficult, sometimes, to place the more intimate details, those qualities that were uniquely _Jason_.

(The scariest thing for him, he thinks, is how there is no way to recover these memories once they’re gone.)

(The worst part, he thinks, is that he remembers most how Jason died, not how he lived.)

(It’s not that he’s forgetting.)


	12. i don't have the advantage you do

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #12, "whale."

Nadia is not one to let others’ opinions influence her. She’s found that it’s so much easier to be happy when she can ignore those voices around her, the ones about how she’s a disappointment compared to Jason, how she’s too standoffish and edgy.

Still, there is this one niggling voice in her head that she can never quite ignore, one that has written unbreakable rules for her: avoid mirrors, avoid going clothes shopping, always make sure her footsteps are light and quiet. 

And the voice goes like this, airy and sad: _slim down, dear. Things will change. After all…_


	13. one life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #13, "guarded."

Sometimes, on the worst days, Peter understands exactly the way Jason felt. Sometimes, Peter wants to hold it all inside and put up a facade the very same way Jason did. Sometimes, Peter wants to leave it all behind, too. 

But Peter can recognize how that is no way to get by, how that would be betraying Jason’s memory, ignoring the lesson Jason left behind for them to learn. It is as much of a reason to stay as it is a reason to go.

The memories remain vivid in his mind; it never quite becomes easy.

Nonetheless, Peter lives.


	14. stay in this moment

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #14, "clock."

Jason swears he can hear the ticking of a clock after he swallows everything in the vial. It’s imposing, eerily in time with the furious pounding of his heart. 

(Jason never thought death could be this frightening.)

The knowledge of what he’s done is both suffocating and relieving. No understanding of what comes after, no turning back.

The clock ticks on.

(Choosing to spend his last moments with Peter is the easiest thing he has ever done.)

The clock stops, and Jason hears nothing at all.

(As Jason collapses, his last thought is that he’s certain he’s going to hell.)


	15. in a perfect world

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #15, "weak."

Jason prides himself on his ability to act, on the way he can pull the wool over anyone's eyes about how he truly feels. A learned skill, polished through years of living with his parents and only further refined by his relationship with Peter.

Acting is more natural for him than being truthful, by now; after all, it works. 

But when Ivy talks about him exactly how he would about Peter, leagues beyond what Jason has ever felt for Ivy, he knows he is neither capable of faking it nor matching it. 

He realizes, then, how acutely broken he is.


	16. looks around in gym

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #16, "angular."

Peter likes to stare at Jason when Jason isn’t paying attention. Jason is pleasing to look at, all soft angles and imposing handsomeness. Peter gets lost in him, sometimes, in the dimple on his left cheek when he smiles, or the way he plays with his pen whenever he’s bored, or the way… 

It’s quiet moments like that which endear Peter to him all the more, that make Peter wonder what them, together, might be like. 

(If Jason catches him staring, he doesn’t say anything. And if he looks at Peter the same way, then Peter doesn’t have to know.)


	17. i've been waiting to tell you this since i was twelve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #17, "swollen."

Jason sprains his ankle playing baseball when he is eleven. The pain and surprise on Jason’s face when Jason runs for the ball and his ankle twists just the wrong way makes Peter hurt, too.

(When Peter goes into the dugout to keep Jason company, he can’t find Jason’s father anywhere. Jason doesn't seem to expect him.)

Jason thanks Peter as he helps Jason back to their room, and Peter knows there’s something deeper to his gratitude. 

(Jason doesn’t say anything more about it, but he doesn’t need to. Peter’s heart swells all warm and sweet when he realizes that.)


	18. when you're pleasing everyone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #18, "bottle."

Peter may not be the actor Jason is, but he is used to, and good, at bottling things up. There are some secrets he hasn't told anyone, like how he feels about his father, or just how insecure Jason can make him feel, sometimes.

There is a certain allure to holding everything inside. It’s easy to get caught in its trap once, even easier to find it becoming a habit. 

But it all has to overflow at some point. Peter is sick of pretending, sick of having to hide from even himself.

It spills out: _You know what? I’m not._


	19. smart money says that's his first move

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #19, "scorched."

Nadia has never been close with her parents; Jason had never been close with them, either. Still, there is a small part of her that will always see them as her parents, that will hold that inseverable connection.

So even though she knows she shouldn’t, she hopes. Some things will never change without something quite as drastic as this, after all.

Their parents do not help plan Jason's funeral. Their parents do not attend Jason’s funeral. In fact, they don't acknowledge Jason at all.

Deep within Nadia, that hope withers, wilts, and dies, like a sapling in a scorched field.


	20. promise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #20, "breakable."

Jason is a liar. It’s what he does every day, by trade: he lies to the girls around him, lies to Father, lies to his teachers, lies to himself. 

But there is one exception: he will never, ever lie to Peter.

That was his hard and fast rule. But everything changes: some things he believed with all his heart to be true turned out to be false. Some promises he made were true for barely a moment. 

He knows Peter doesn’t believe in him, or even trust him anymore, and Jason is sure that this is retribution for his sins.


	21. i wish to g-d i felt that way

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober #21, "drain."

In a perfect world, Jason could love Ivy the way they both want him to. But this is not a perfect world, and Jason can only pretend.

He waits to learn how to love Ivy like how she promised would happen, waits for everything he felt for Peter to fade, waits to be happy like he always thought he would be. 

(Jason does love Ivy. He does, but not in a way that will ever make him happy.)

They have the white picket fences, a dog, children, everything he’s ever wanted. It should all fall right together.

It never does.


	22. a simple love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #22, "expensive."

There is a moment just before Jason downs the GHB where time freezes. Jason’s thoughts all suddenly become clear. 

They come unbidden, slow and steady: that nobody will miss the real him, that there were so many other ways this could have gone, that he would see another day if he hadn’t met Peter.

Then time begins to move again. He hears the clamor, the last-minute rehearsals, of all the students around him.

The GHB feels strange in his throat, and he thinks, if the cost of meeting Peter—of knowing himself—was his life, then it was worth it.


	23. always thought we'd talk one day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #23, "muddy."

Jason is still very much a part of Nadia’s life, after. Nadia’s memories of him are crisp but worn at the edges, revisited time and time again. She always looks back on the hidden moments of their childhood, playing in puddles and working together to hide it from their parents.

If one person brought her through her childhood, it was Jason. Without him, the future seems to be getting muddier and muddier as time passes.

Peter helps, though: nobody loved or knew Jason like the both of them. In a way, between the two of them, Jason is still alive.


	24. as i try to move on

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #24, "chop."

Every now and then, Peter has nightmares. They’re disjointed scenes stitched together with no rhyme or reason save for that they all _hurt_ , with echoes of _You know what? I’m not_ , of _I tried_ , of _forward is calling, and I cannot stay here_.

The guilt is one heavy enough to root him in place. He knows it’s not his fault, not really, but he still had a hand in it. A hand is more than enough.

(Even after all this time, Peter can't let go of the realization that if he had never met Jason, Jason would still be alive.)


	25. but i must confess i came up empty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #25, "prickly."

To Matt, the most important thing is being a moral person. But it’s _hard_ to be upstanding when it seems like the whole world is against him, when every day seems to hold something worse than the last one.

He truly, honestly tries to not let his jealousy towards Jason take hold of him. (Envy is a sin, his mind whispers to him.) But Matt is not that strong of a person.

After it all, he always wonders what a true friendship between them could have been like if he had been the person he always wished he could be.


	26. thoughts enslave him

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #26, "stretch."

Years after St. Cecilia’s, Peter and Jason have found their own little nook and cranny of the world where everything is just right: Claire has come around, Jason’s parents aren’t in the picture, and they aren’t hiding anymore. They are happy. 

But there are little imperfections, here and there. Peter can’t seem to remember what Jason’s voice would be like when he first wakes up, or the way he'd subtly fidget when he was nervous, or the way he’d…

(Sometimes, in Peter’s mind, Jason is still alive. Peter can dream, and dream, and dream, but they’re all only that: dreams.)


	27. where nothing's as it seems

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #27, "thunder."

Thunderstorms are common during springs at St. Cecilia’s. Peter loves to watch the way the sky cracks apart, lightning spilling to the ground, the way rain beats against the window in a steady rhythm.

Jason, though, is terrified of them. Peter would have to be blind to miss all the signs of how scared he is whenever one rolls around.

They’ve developed a system to help Jason through them. And if they sit a little closer each time Peter rubs Jason’s back, or if they sometimes fall asleep in the same bed while Peter is telling stories, it's their secret.


	28. the best kept secret

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #28, "gift."

There are mountains upon mountains that stand before Jason. He has yet to even consider climbing them, much less overcoming them.

But Peter’s words ring in his mind whenever he finds himself in a dark place. They’ve echoed nonstop: _you have to give the world a chance_.

When Jason stops to think about it, he realizes he hasn’t. He saw the mountains before him, how they reached up beyond the clouds, and never thought them scalable. 

Little by little, he opens his heart and lets the world in. There is fear, regret, and sorrow; but there is also joy, eventually.


	29. put away the fairytales

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #29, "double."

Peter trusts Jason with his whole being. Jason is the first and only person that Peter confided in about his sexuality, the first and only person that Peter believes would love him no matter what.

Eve Peter marvels at the level of connection and trust the two of them have. But as Jason spits at him that _there’s no such thing as heroes as who are queer_ , Peter realizes that there is a whole other person somewhere inside Jason, one that he wishes he never came to know, one that he had never envisioned, not even in his worst nightmares.


	30. all i needed was his hand in mine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #30, "jolt."

When Peter tells Jason that he _tried_ , Jason realizes with a jolt that Peter is moving on, going somewhere Jason isn’t strong enough to follow him to. He has no expectation or desire for Jason to follow him. It’s the straw that breaks the camel’s back.

(Jason gets a tiny taste of what death will be like when Peter tells him that _forward is calling_ , that he _cannot stay here_. He doesn’t want to be forgotten. He doesn’t want to be just a sad memory. He doesn’t want to be just a regret.)

(But Jason knows he will be, eventually.)


	31. wedding bells

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> for inktober day #31, "slice."

The road through recovery is rocky and rough, but Jason and Peter make it through, as they always have. They stick together.

Peter pops the question one evening. The sky is all indigo-violet. Everything is soft and quiet and perfect.

Jason seizes up and looks at Peter, almost frightened for a moment, before it melts away. His _yes, yes, yes_ is shaky through his tears.

Peter knows that he’s found his own slice of heaven, that there is no way G-d could disapprove if it makes him this happy. Judging by how Jason can’t stop smiling, he shares the sentiment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you to everyone who stuck through this with me... ilysm and thank you for your support !! and again big thanks to clem for betaing all these ;v; love u babe


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